Three elderly South Florida women say TSA made them strip

December 5, 2011|By Ken Kaye, Staff Writer

Three South Florida women, all elderly and with medical problems, say Transportation Security Administration officers made them take off their clothes during the screening process at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport last week.

All three, one with a defibrillator, one with a colostomy bag and the other with diabetes, say they were forced to disrobe in a private room at the same terminal.

"This was outrageous," Lenore Zimmerman, 84, who winters in the Wynmoor Village condominium complex in Coconut Creek, said on Monday. "For some reason, they decided I look like a terrorist."

The TSA says no improper strip searches were conducted – in that none of the women were improperly touched – and all standard protocols were followed. The agency noted all passengers must be carefully screened no matter how old or young they are to ensure no explosives end up on a plane.

In the case of people with special medical needs or disabilities, the TSA's policy is it must check any metal devices that might set off alarms. Usually this can be done by a pat-down, which would not require any clothing to be removed, the TSA said.

The TSA declined to say whether there are instances where it requires passengers to remove clothing items.

All three incidents took place during Thanksgiving week, the busiest travel period during the year, although the TSA said it conducts secondary screenings the same way no matter the volume.

"Terrorists remain focused on attacking transportation through tactics such as concealing explosives under clothing," the agency said in a statement.

None of the woman said they were asked to take off clothing on their way to New York, only on the way back, the result of the TSA's random selection of who receives secondary screenings combined with the officers' judgment of how in-depth those screenings need to be.

Zimmerman said prior to catching a JetBlue flight to Fort Lauderdale on Nov. 29, she asked TSA officers to bypass the body scanner machine because has a defibrillator. She also requires a wheelchair while traveling.

She said she was taken to a private room and asked to take off her pants and underwear. She said officers wanted to see a back brace she needs to wear after recent spinal surgery.

"They didn't touch me, but they told me to pull my pants down," said Zimmerman, a widow, adding she felt humiliated. "My blood pressure after the incident was 189 over 90, and it shouldn't be that high."

She said she missed her 1 p.m. flight but caught one two and half hours later.

To make matters worse, Zimmerman said, while in her wheelchair, she had a metal walker and a suitcase in her lap as she was being taken to the private room. She said the walker slipped and cut her shin, requiring an emergency medical technician bandage her leg.

"Because I'm on blood thinners, I bled like pig," she said.

The TSA disputed Zimmerman's version of events in a blog, posted on its web site.

It said, "TSA contacted the passenger to apologize that she feels she had an unpleasant screening experience; however, TSA does not include strip searches in its protocols and a strip search did not occur in this case."

The blog noted Zimmerman was privately screened by two female officers, who checked her back brace.

"The item was removed, re-screened, and the passenger was cleared for travel. Nothing unusual was depicted on the [close circuit] TV, as the passenger and two female officers entered and exited the room," the blog said.

Linda Kallish, 66, of Boynton Beach, was scheduled to be on the same flight as Zimmerman. Because she is diabetic, she has a glucose monitor that checks her blood sugar every five minutes strapped to one leg and an insulin pump strapped on the other.

After she set off the metal detector, a female TSA officer ordered her into a private room and told her to take her pants off, Kallish said. She said the officer didn't touch her.

"So I took my pants off and showed it to her," Kallish said. "She just looked at it and said, 'Have a nice trip.'"

What really bothered her, Kallish said, is that while waiting to be screened, her medical items went through the metal detector and moved out of her sight, and she wasn't allowed to retrieve them.

"The whole thing is lousy," Kallish said. "I've have never had to do that before. I have flown many times before, and I have never had to take my pants down."

She said the TSA sent her a "stock e-mail, saying they were sorry for any inconvenience." The good news, she said, is she caught her flight.

In a third case, Ruth Sherman, 88, of Sunrise, was returning home from New York on Nov. 29, when TSA officers noticed the bulge from her colostomy bag, accord to CBS News.

"This is private for me. It's bad enough that I have it. I had to pull it from my sweat pants and I had to pull my underwear down," she told a correspondent for WCBS, a New York television station. "You don't do that to anybody. I felt like I was invaded."

TSA spokesman Jon Allen said the agency still is investigating the cases involving Kallish and Sherman.

TSA officials noted whenever a person opts out of the body scanner, secondary screenings, including pat-downs, are conducted "in a manner that treats all passengers with dignity, respect and courtesy."